the sun went higher. Though the woods were pure and clean I could
smell blood everywhere. In time a man dropped from exhaustion. At
that I gave the word to go back to camp.

The camp itself was less terrible than the memories that had been with
me as I walked through the unsullied woods. The wounded were cared for
and the dead buried. The Indians were gathered around their separate
fires, chanting, feeding, bragging, and sleeping. The French had made
a camp at one side, and they, too, were seeking comfort through food
and sleep. Life was progressing as if the mutilated dead had never
been.

We had succeeded, Cadillac assured me. All the Senecas were dead or
captured and our total loss, French and savage, was only seventy-five
men. We had but few wounded, and the surgeon said they would recover.

I nodded, took food, and went alone to eat. I sat there a long time.
Cadillac came toward me once as if to speak, but looked at me and
turned away.

At last I had made up my mind, and I went to the hut where I had left
Pemaou. It had taken time to fight down my longing for even combat
with him, but I knew that I must not risk that, for I needed to keep my
life for a time. So I would try for speech with him first, and then he
should die. And since he must die helpless, he must die as painlessly
as possible. Physical revenge had become abominable to me. It was
inadequate.

I entered the hut. Pemaou's figure lay, face downward, on the floor.
It had a rigidity that did not come from the thongs that bound it. I
turned it over. The Indian's throat was cut. Life had flowed out of
the red, horrible opening.

I think that I cursed at the dead man. Corpse that he was, he had
tricked me again, for I had hoped, against reason, to force information
from him. Death had not dignified his wolfish face. He had died, as
he had lived, a snarling animal, whose sagacity was that of the brute.
And I had lost with him this time, as I had lost before, by taking
thought, and so losing time. An animal does not hesitate, and he is a
fool who deliberates in dealing with him. I tasted desolation as I
stood there.

A moccasin stepped behind me. "I killed him," said Singing Arrow's
voice.

I turned. She was terrible to look at. Life had given this savage
woman strength of will and soul without training to balance it. She
was Nemesis incarnate. Yet blood-stained and tragic as was her face,
her words were calm.

"He kil